Originally posted by Marsupial at 31-5-2009 10:53
(By the way, IS there a standard romanization of Cantonese? Seems like every guy in this forum spells the words differently.)
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Don’t know if there is one standard Romanization system for Cantonese as there seem to be several around. I guess the reason is that dialects like Cantonese are basically discouraged by the government in Beijing, so no serious scholarly efforts have been made to standardize things. Even in Guangzhou (or Canton), Cantonese is sort of considered a ghetto’s language compared to Putonghua which has a more official status.
All Romanization systems of Cantonese seem to have originated from Hong Kong when it was under the British rule. I heard some may have even been invented by Hong Kong expats in the US. That’s why it is so confusing. But the one I prefer is
http://www.cantonese.sheik.co.uk/scripts/wordlist.htm
I found it rather easy to use. You just type in English words and out come the Cantonese and Mandarin equivalents with spellings that I can easily use to pronounce. With this site, I am able to make good progress with my Cantonese without having to pay for a class.